Clara Reeve

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CR , late-eighteenth-century novelist, wrote both gothic and contemporary novels (the first being her best known), as well as poetry and a pioneer work of serious criticism about the novel form. At the end of her life she reckoned her published output at twenty-one volumes, not counting pamphlets.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Oval portrait of Clara Reeve, drawn by A. H. Tourrier, etched by Dammam. She is seen from the waist up, arms folded, standing beside a plant in a tall pot. She is wearing a simple striped dress with darker cloth crossed over her chest, a printed shawl around her shoulders, and a white cap her head. Her name is written beneath.

Milestones

23 January 1729

CR was born at Ipswich in Suffolk, the eldest daughter in a family of eight children.
Trainer, James, and Clara Reeve. “Introduction”. The Old English Baron, Oxford University Press.
xii
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

1769

CR published her first book, Original Poems on Several Occasions.
Battestin, Martin C., editor. Dictionary of Literary Biography 39. Vol. 2 vols., Gale Research.
372

By July 1785

CR published at Colchester her most famous work, The Progress of Romance through Times, Countries, and Manners, incorporating The History of Charoba, Queen of Ægypt.
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
60 (1785): 54
Trainer, James, and Clara Reeve. “Introduction”. The Old English Baron, Oxford University Press.
xxi

1802

CR published her last known work, a historical novel intended for young people and entitled Edwin , King of Northumberland: a story of the seventh century.
Kelly, Gary. “Clara Reeve, Provincial Bluestocking: From the Old Whigs to the Modern Liberal State”. Reconsidering the Bluestockings, edited by Nicole Pohl and Betty Schellenberg, Huntington Library, pp. 105-25.
120

3 December 1807

CR died at Ipswich in Suffolk.
Trainer, James, and Clara Reeve. “Introduction”. The Old English Baron, Oxford University Press.
xiv, xxi
Battestin, Martin C., editor. Dictionary of Literary Biography 39. Vol. 2 vols., Gale Research.
376

Biography

23 January 1729

CR was born at Ipswich in Suffolk, the eldest daughter in a family of eight children.
Trainer, James, and Clara Reeve. “Introduction”. The Old English Baron, Oxford University Press.
xii
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
She belonged to the professional group within in the English middle classes, whose status was secure though their incomes were not high.

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